Avery looked down. A small set of tracks her daughter's size led away from the cabin and deeper into the dense trees. She took off, following the tracks. Cold air rasped her lungs, and her fingers were numb by the time they reached the copse of pine.
Hailey was so small. She wouldn't make it long exposed to these temperatures. It had to be in the twenties. Hailey couldn't talk, either. If she needed help, she couldn't ask for it. Avery had done her research before the move. She knew the vegetation and wildlife, knew her daughter was at risk for an animal attack and from what animals. Black bears, mountain lions, and bobcats sprang to mind. Hailey wouldn't know how to defend herself.
Tears blurred her eyes. She quickened her pace to a sprint, kicking up snow in her wake.
Be okay, sweetie. Be okay.
The footprints made a hard right and, as they rounded a bend, the breath left her lungs in a whoosh.
Hailey was sitting on a stump, her back to them. Her pink coat was still on, but she didn't have her hat. The relief was dizzying.
“Hailey.” Avery circled the stump and squatted. “We talked about this, sweetie. You cannot go running off—”
There was blood. Lots of blood. At Hailey's feet. On the front of her coat.
“Where are you hurt? Where are you hurt, sweetie?” She ran her trembling, frozen fingers over Hailey's head, down her neck, to her chest, and stopped.
A furry, warm head poked out of Hailey's partially opened coat.
A scream wedged in Avery's throat until she realized it was a dog. No, a puppy. A little, tan-colored fluffy thing. Hailey was rocking it, stroking its head, and jerking her gaze around.
Recognizing the motions as nervous and scared, Avery kept her voice quiet. Hailey would never hurt a living thing, so she had to have found the animal out here. “You found a doggy. It's okay, Hailey. Is the doggy hurt? Is that where the blood is coming from? Can Mommy see?”
Gently, she lifted the trembling ball of fur from her daughter's grasp and the poor thing yelped. Surprised by the noise in the quiet night, she fell back on her butt in the snow. It couldn't have been more than six weeks old. Seven pounds, max. Sad, scared brown eyes looked into hers and Avery melted.
“Well, crap on a cracker. You're adorable.”
“Avery…its leg.” Mom jerked her chin toward the dog and shoved her hands into her pockets.
Avery's gaze swept over the animal in the moonlight and eyed what her mother was talking about. The lower half of one of its front legs was severed clean. Blood saturated the fur. Her stomach churned. What could've happened to it?
Nausea swirled in her gut. “You poor thing.”
Hailey began rocking in earnest.
Avery reached over and clasped a hand on her daughter's arm. “It's going to be okay, sweetie.”
She looked at her mom, at a loss. She'd never had a pet before. It was freezing outside and who knew how long the little guy had been hurt out in the woods or how much blood it had lost. By all the red marring the snow, it seemed like a lot for such a small thing. It didn't have tags or a collar. It was doing little more than whimpering and trembling. She needed to get Hailey out of the elements, too.
Her mom unwrapped the scarf from her neck and passed it to her. “I'll call the O'Gradys. They own the vet clinic in town. Go. I'll take Hailey back to the cabin—”
Hailey shot to her feet and grabbed Avery's jacket, a sound of duress escaping her throat even as her gaze darted elsewhere.
“She wants to come.” She looked at her mom. “Zip her coat, would you? Call the vet. We need to go. This little guy doesn't have long.”
* * * *
Cade O'Grady stared at the tiny gray kitten as it sucked milk from the bottle he held. The furball was small enough to fit in one of his hands. Anger surged again, so he blew out a breath and glanced around the small confines of his clinic office.
It was late, and he'd decided to stay to catch up on some charts. That was two hours ago, and said charts were still in need of dictations. Good thing he'd stayed or the tiny kitten in his hand would've died, just like its mother and siblings.
What the hell kind of person left a box of kittens outside a clinic door in the snow? Cade had no idea how long they'd been in the elements—someone had dropped them by the kennels outside the back door—but the kitten he was currently feeding was the only survivor. He gnashed his teeth, mad enough to kill the SOB if he ever found him.
Luckily, the kitten, which looked like a Brazilian Shorthair, was made of strong stuff. She'd taken to feeding right away and didn't need an IV. In his exam, the temp and BP had been good, all things considered, and he found no outward signs of trouble.
Closing his eyes, he listened to the answering machine kick on from the reception desk outside his office. If it were an emergency, he'd be paged, since it was his week on call. Animal Instincts was a small clinic, started by his father forty years ago and run by Cade and his two brothers since the old man had passed away. Almost nine years now. Hard to believe.
The bottle empty, he set it on his desk and eyed the kitten. “You are a cute little bugger.”
It mewed in agreement.
He laughed for the first time all day and rubbed its head. “Modest, too. I think I shall call you Cutin. Get it? Combining cute and kitten? Cutin.”
Mew.
“You're right. They should take my man card on the spot.”
Paws kneading, it settled into the crook of his arm and fell asleep.
“I'll take that as a yes. Can I get you anything else? A beer perhaps?”
It didn't respond. She. She didn't respond. He should stop calling her it.
Shaking his head, he pulled a chart closer. His pager went off. He cursed. Just as he reached for it in his scrubs pocket, a pounding rattled the front door.
He glanced at the kitten. “Today sucked.”
She mewed sleepily to second the thought. Word! Try having my day.
Rising, he settled Cutin on a pillow in a box on an office chair and checked the pager as he walked to the front door. The banging intensified. He didn't recognize the number, but the woman standing outside the clinic was Justine something-or-other, who owned a resale shop down the street.
He unlocked the door and held it open. At least the snow had stopped. “Was it you who paged me?”
She rushed inside, followed by a woman he didn't know, and a little girl about eight. “Yes, I paged.” Justine pushed dark, windblown hair out of her face.
He closed and relocked the door against the biting airstream coming down off the mountain.
The other woman held out her arms. Inside a knit scarf was a puppy.
Cade looked down at all the blood on the girl's pink coat. Shit. Kicked into action, he motioned for them to follow. “This way.”
“I'm going to wait out here in the lobby,” Justine said, her face a suspicious shade of green. “All that medical stuff… I'll be good out here.” She sat down hard to emphasize her point.
Inside an exam room, he donned gloves, turned, and reached for the animal. “What happened?”
“I'm not sure. Hailey found it in the snow about thirty minutes ago.” Her voice was hurried, but calm, not showing any signs she was unnerved by all the blood.
Gingerly, he set the puppy on the table and unwrapped the scarf, taking stock of the situation. Yellow lab. Male. Eyes barely open. Lethargic. Underweight. About five or six weeks old. Trembling. Leg severed below the knee. Wound clotting and not actively bleeding.
Son